Microsoft off target in 'Scroogled' ads

By James Temple :
February 7, 2013
: Updated: February 7, 2013 10:23pm

Microsoft's campaign takes aim at Google for its use of targeted advertising in Gmail.

It's become embarrassing to watch Microsoft try again and again to sling flimsy arrows at the business practices and ethics of Google, as the search giant continues to clean the software company's clock.

But here we go again, with the announcement this week that the Redmond, Wash., company is rolling out yet another "Scroogled" ad campaign aimed at Google's perceived soft underbelly: privacy.

That follows Microsoft's earlier marketing efforts of the same nature, whisper campaigns with reporters, the largely failed attempt to get the Federal Trade Commission to take action against the company and a ploy to paint itself as a privacy champion that was so desperate it helped derail the industry debate on do-not-track standards.

Yahoo's Director of Public Policy Chris Sherwood once said in a tweet precisely what rings true for me today: "Get over Google, guys."

It's unseemly. It's sad. And some of it is downright hypocritical.

The latest print, online and TV ads will highlight Microsoft's survey results indicating that lots of people don't realize that, say, a Florida hotel ad popping up next to their e-mail message about a planned Florida vacation was generated by the content of the message. And most of them disapprove of the practice when they find out.

"Most folks, if you ask them, find it creepy," said Stefan Weitz, director of Microsoft's Bing search engine. "They find it a violation of social norms."

Pitch for Outlook

The ad campaign says these people should switch from Google's Gmail to Microsoft's Outlook.com, which would never deliver such ads to its users (except in the ways that it does, but more on that shortly).

I'm not convinced that as many people are as naive about e-mail ad targeting as Microsoft's survey results (70 percent) suggest.

Why? Because that's the answer Microsoft wanted and, as any pollster will tell you, you can get the result you desire by tweaking where, when and how you conduct your survey. Plus, others have found that most people do notice ad targeting, including a Pew Internet & American Life Project study last year that found 59 percent of people did.

As for Microsoft's stat saying that 88 percent of folks disapprove of such practices after learning about it? There's a big difference between the portion of people who disapprove of the idea of targeted ads in the abstract, and those who really care about it - enough to perhaps switch to a new e-mail provider.

Let me be perfectly clear. I'm not saying I'm OK with all of Google's practices. I've criticized the company on privacy issues numerous times. And I had sympathy for certain aspects of the FTC's antitrust investigation into the company.

I'm also well aware that the tech industry is a full-contact sport, and that Microsoft isn't alone in employing these sorts of tactics. Indeed, plenty of the company's enemies worked hard to build momentum behind the antitrust case it faced in the late 1990s, including IBM and Sun.

I just don't think any of that justifies continuing this cycle of ugly corporate behavior. And above all, I find it hard to stomach Microsoft portraying itself as a paragon of privacy virtue, when in fact, it's mostly splitting privacy hairs.

After all, the company readily helps advertisers tailor ads for Outlook.com based on demographic information like gender and location that users provide when signing up.

No less invasive

And while the company might not scan the actual message for the purpose of delivering ads, it does scan them for the purpose of blocking spam, which is technically no more or less invasive. It just might seem creepier when you actually see a related ad pop up.

When it comes to the Bing search engine, Microsoft lets marketers target ads based on a user's location, age, gender, device or search keywords.

Weitz defended Microsoft's latest campaign and products. He said independent reviews indicate that Outlook.com is already a better e-mail service, and that it's the fastest-growing one in the nation. The ad campaign merely underscores important points of differentiation that people care about, he said.

Weitz disputes that the company is splitting hairs. He says people generally are OK with ads based on keyword searches or demographics, but feel differently about a similar use of their private communications.

"We're winning on products, but now the challenge is, (technical features) don't necessarily move the needle," Weitz said. "So we have to do something that helps consumers understand one of the biggest differences: We don't target ads and they do."

Other incidents

But when Microsoft talks about privacy, I recall other incidents:

Like the time it applied for a patent that would have helped the government "silently record communication" over Internet phone calls and video chats.

Or when it stripped out a privacy feature in Internet Explorer that would have automatically blocked common tracking tools. The company's engineers were apparently overruled by executives who argued that the feature would have made it harder to make money from online ads, according to a Wall Street Journal story at the time.

Against that backdrop, the high-minded privacy rhetoric sounds more like a cynical attempt by a company that's simply been beat in the market to win back share.

If Microsoft wants more people to use Bing and Outlook.com, it should focus its money and efforts on developing them into products that are so much better in such obvious ways that customers arrive on their own. That, after all, is precisely what Google did with Gmail.